Corporate America

Time For A Revolution

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 2 Comments

There has been a lot of attention given to the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations.  And I think it is great that we are finally standing up to the big corporations that have gotten us into the current economic crisis.  The companies that have decided that profit at the cost of the citizenry of the US is more important.  But one thing that has been ignored in the conversation, Education. Corporate America needs to be reformed, but so does Education.  I would argue that the real reform of our educational system is a more dire need.  A generation of students (if not more) have already lost their chance–have already lost their future.

Education is a huge part of our countries current issues.  We are graduating more students over all (even though my city currently only graduates 48% of students), but fewer of them can read, write and think critically.  Yet in the name of reform, we turn a blind eye.  I have written a lot about education.  This is certainly not all inclusive of everything I have written about education, but it is a big part of it.  I read this op-ed this morning and it resounded with the what Kelly (aka mochamomma) wrote and Nancy Letts wrote recently.  We know what is needed in education.  We know how important early childhood education is.  We know that students, especially young students learn best through curiosity and inquiry.  We know that students learn by teaching each other and that inquiry leads to increased critical thinking.  We know that writing is a tool for thinking and that students should be writing in every class and reading in every class.  We know that homework should be relevant and not just filler.  We know homework should be meaningful.  We know that standardized test play a role, but aren’t a complete measurement of what students know.  We know that problem solving and collaboration are two of the most important skills students need to be ready for college and the workforce, yet our schools focus on skill and drill activities that students do alone for the purpose of filling in a bubble on a test.

Many urban and under-performing schools purchase canned curriculum that tests students every six weeks and offers pacing guides that tell teachers where they need to be–taking the art out of teaching; taking the choice out of teaching.  I would have withered as a public school teacher under these circumstances.  I left the classroom after NCLB, but before the huge accountability push of testing.  I was a great teacher.  I was the kind of teacher I want my students to have.  I knew other great teachers, who knew their students, who knew what their students needed and how students learned.  I worked hard to make sure that my students were getting what they needed and were learning. I didn’t do test prep with my students and mine always scored highest on their standardized tests.  But I can’t take the credit for than anymore than I can take the blame.  A student’s performance on a standardized test is a snapshot of their schooling not one teachers classroom.  I also believe that if we are teaching the way we as trained teachers know we should, then test score are moot.  The problem has become that teachers have lost their autonomy.  Teachers have lost their ability to teach and are not often expected to just deliver the information and move students through the pacing guide decided for them from an outside corporation who doesn’t know the students are even the school.  This is a huge issue.

Teachers need to push back.  Teachers need to take back education.  Teachers need to take back the curriculum and make it theirs and their students’.

Parents need to demand funding for early childhood education.  Parents need to demand early childhood education that isn’t about worksheets and tests.  Parents need to demand that schools do better.  We need to demand that schools do better.  Our students deserve the best education possible.  I want to be able to send my kids to public school in my urban district and know they are getting the best education.  A quality education.  An education that will push them to grow and learn.  An education that will challenge them.  An education that demands that they think and problem solve.  An education that demands they investigate and ask questions.  Right now…I can only buy this type of education for my kids and that isn’t fair to the kids whose parents can’t pay.

We have a hierarchical educational system, as a teacher and educational researcher, I have always believed this.  We have schools that create and educate leaders and schools that create and educate workers.  That isn’t right.  We should have one system that educates everyone to their potential.

I think about an article I read about those is power who were poor students and got poor grades in school.  Yet they are leaders because of where they went to school, not because of what they learned.  Students who go to urban public schools shouldn’t be relegated to the second class.  Yet they are.  It’s wrong and it’s time we took a stand.

Why can’t Bill Gates and the other corporate philanthropists look at what works?  They could easily fund early childhood education for all with the money they are spending on charter schools and other reform initiatives that are really just about testing.   If they really wanted to make a difference they would invest money in colleges of education to allow for more teacher residency programs (programs the mirror the residency programs for doctors).  If they really wanted to make a difference they would ask educators what works.

It’s time for a revolution.  It’s time for change.  Our children deserve it.  Our children need it.

Because I Need To Write About Something Other Than My Children

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / 2 Comments

I love learning new things and try very hard to not just buy the line that the media and political machine try to feed me. Sometimes, I just don’t have the knowledge to reject the propaganda and therefore, I tend to ignore it as I am pretty confident they aren’t telling me the whole truth or even a part of it sometimes. 

This post is about oil.  Not the kind you cook with, although that might be an interesting topic.  I have always been anti-more drilling especially up in Alaska where the land is untouched and should stay that way.  I also wish we would take the money that it costs to drill a well (50-100 million bucks each) and invest in alternative energy sources and technology.  But we are a country controlled by money and by big oil so we continue to plug along “in love” with big oil. 

I have never understood the whole “lets gets more oil here in the U.S. and not have to be dependent on foreign oil.”  I knew this was not how it worked, but I never really understood the complexities of the industry and this global economy.  Well, I am now enlightened.  Not completely enlightened, but more so than I was before.  I was listening to talk radio the other day and they were talking about the oil industry and how it really works.  I was fascinated as I had no real idea about it at all. 

Drilling for more oil in the U.S. will in no way lessen our dependence on foreign oil.  Why not you ask?  Good question.  Oil is sold on a global market which means that oil pumped from the U.S. doesn’t ensure sale to the U.S.  Because oil isn’t a government operation here in the U.S. like in other countries (Venezuela, Saudi Arabia, Iraq) we don’t keep it for ourselves it goes onto the global market and then the U.S. buys oils from this market at a price decided on by the traders who determine the price.  I think that this is so interesting and really cements for me the amount of propaganda the comes out of the GOP.  More oil in America does not mean more oil for America.  This reinforces my disgust for big oil and my desire to own one of Honda’s new hydrogen cars.  If only I still lived in California. 

We need to educate ourselves as consumers and make sure we understand the economy and how it works the best we can so that we can make informed decisions about whom and what we support. 

Who Deserves The Help–Corporate America or American People?

/ Dawn Kasal-Finley / Leave a comment

And the two are very very different.  In the NY Times this morning there is an article about the loss of 80,000 jobs in March.  With a recession so obviously hanging out at the end of the bar, just finishing his drink waiting to let everyone see that he certainly is indeed in our midst, everyone is trying to create more consumer confidence.  Maybe if things we bought were made in America without lead paint or magnets that are so small they fall off and our kids can die from swallowing them, we might have more consumer confidence–but this certainly isn’t what this post is about. 

It is in these situations of crisis that are polar differences are never more clearly seen.  At times like this, I am often reminded why I am a Democrat.  With more jobs being lost and the cost of goods skyrocketing–because the cost of gas is so high–and just so you know the execs at the big 5 oil companies aren’t to blame for the high prices–its the high price of crude that is to blame.  They’d like us to ignore the 100+ billion dollars in profits they made last year.  Really, I am pretty sure they don’t know how that happened.  As they try to preserve the 10 million dollars in tax breaks that they still need to ensure the stability of the industry.  Are you fucking kidding me?  I know where that 10 million could be spent to actually benefit the American people, because right now the only one benefiting is an industry that certainly isn’t passing along any of it profits to those who struggle to keep their gas stations open (the average gas station only profits one penny per gallon of gas) while lining the pockets of those who sit at the top trying to figure out how they are making so much money.  Maybe their making all that money–selling it at really high prices?  Just a guess. 

Back to what originally got me going on this topic.  There was a call from Pelosi to act immediately with an additional stimulus package to help Americans.  The Dems (Clinton and Obama) want to increase the length of time someone can collect unemployment–seems fair in this type of job market.  The GOP (McCain) will support tax breaks and less regulation for companies (i.e. oil companies and others that are lots of money already)–he believes (as does the GOP on the whole) that if companies have more money they will create more jobs.  Really?  I pretty sure they only care about profit margin and if creating more jobs weakens that margin?  They aren’t creating more jobs.  I am certainly not an economist, but I don’t understand the idea of giving tax breaks to companies and hoping they will employ more people–while at the same time Congress won’t increase minimum wages because that would hurt the same companies. It just doesn’t make sense that we can trust companies in our frenzy of Capitalistic greed to be fair.  How could we reallly expect fairness when the average CEO makes in one day what an average employee makes in one year?  But let’s give them tax breaks and less regulation. 

So, who deserves the help of the government?  The people who they swear to represent (that is us those who elect or don’t elect (in some cases) them) or the companies (read as lobbyists) who line their pockets?  I have learned a long time ago that money buys access and as we Americans have less money and companies have more and more money–the companies have the access and those with the access determine what happens.  Just think back to Cheney’s response to the idea that 2/3 of the American people thought we should pull out of Iraq “SO WHAT.”  It angers me and saddens me and scares me that as days and years pass–the American people seem to be less and less important to the government we are suppose to trust to take care of us. 

Is a revolution coming????